Asus Padfone to pack a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 chip

Despite showing its Padfone smartphone-tablet transforming device off way back at Computex, Asus is still maintaining silence on its specifications. Thankfully, the GLBenchmark results database isn't so reticent.

Unveiled by Asus boss Jonney Shih ahead of Computex in May, the Padfone is yet another transforming tablet from the company. Unlike the Eee Pad Transformer, which aims to remove the need to carry a tablet and a netbook, the Padfone looks to make it unnecessary to have a tablet and a phone.

Built around Google's Android platform, the Padfone has two parts: a traditional-looking smartphone, and a clever tablet docking station. Pop the smartphone into the back of the tablet, and whatever you were working on appears on the large multi-touch display.

It's a clever concept, but since Shih's announcement the company has gone quiet. We've known for some time that Asus has been waiting for Android 4.0 'Ice Cream Sandwich' - the release of Google's popular mobile platform which reunites the split Android 2.3 'Gingerbread' smartphone branch with the Android 3.0 'Honeycomb' tablet branch - but since its release Asus has been surprisingly silent.

While the company is still not talking details - beyond a vague hope of a pre-Christmas launch - benchmark results from pre-release Padfone prototypes have started to appear on the popular GLBenchmark site, revealing a design win for Qualcomm's next-generation Krait-based Snapdragon S4 processor.

According to the results uploaded to the public benchmark database, the Padfone will pack a Qualcomm MSM8960 dual-core 1.5GHz processor, built on a 28nm process, with integrated Adreno 225 graphics and support for 3G and LTE networking baked in to the system-on-chip design.

It's worth pointing out that the results represent a far from finished device, however: rather than the planned Android 4.0 'Ice Cream Sandwich' build, the prototype Padfone is running Android 2.3.5 'Gingerbread' - something Asus will have to work on prior to release.